After seven years of silence in Seville, he opens an exhibition at Mecánica del Arte 

Matías Sánchez (Germany, 1972) was forged as a painter in Seville, the city where he lives. Sánchez was absent from galleries and exhibitions for seven years. ”I was a painter from the Cavecanem gallery, with which I presented my work at art fairs such as Arco, the gallery closed and I have since worked with others from outside Seville, but not here. Now this exhibition has arisen out of friendship with Pablo Barragán who directs Mecánica del Arte.” The exhibition is entitled ”Of flesh and blood” and it’s only very material painting, in homage to the Impressionist painters. 

However, in these seven years it has not been difficult for the artist to find new galleries to present his work, “it is not complicated abroad, but Seville is a limited world and there are many artists for a few galleries. In Spain I work with galleries in Valencia, Malaga and the Canary Islands and outside of Spain, in Canada and Milan». 

Sánchez is currently collaborating with the Christopher Cutts Gallery in Toronto, as well as with the Vostell Gallery in Berlin. He was one of the young Spanish artists participating in the Scope Basel in Basel (Switzerland) in 2009. 

”I am satisfied to be able to live from painting, and usually the crisis is noticeable, but it is not that of construction either. In Spain, there were a lot of young customers who bought contemporary art and that had to do with the real estate boom, but not outside of Spain, because there is a long-standing collecting habit, and I already have collectors of my work, especially in Milan and Mexico.” Recently, the prestigious Museum of Contemporary Art at the University of Los Angeles acquired a work by Sánchez, ”something of which I am particularly proud,” says the artist. 

This international projection of the painter has convinced him that “you can live in Seville and project yourself out into the world. The Internet is an infinite window. You can live in Seville, it is comfortable and cheap, because living in Cologne, Basel or Los Angeles -which is where painting moves- is very expensive.” 

In these last seven years, Matías Sánchez’s painting has eliminated and synthesized his speech that was previously much more aggressive. ”I did not do a vindictive expressionist painting, but I painted and then put up some signs, and it was a tougher work in terms of the message. But the text did not concern me so much, what worried me was the painting.” 

In this exhibition the artist is freer and has enjoyed the canvas, “I have paid tribute to the brave people who fought for painting in extremely poor situations and continued to believe in what they did. They were the great revolutionaries.” He refers to Impressionists such as Toulouse Lautrec, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt (who by the way painted in Seville in 1873), Degas ... ”In their time they were outcasts, today they are gods. Their work went unnoticed, and that shows that painting is valued more over time. The end of the life of these artists coincides with the beginning of speculation in art, but they are the parents of everything that came later.” 

For Matías Sánchez, the current moment is “a bit chaotic because there is no criteria and anything goes. The art that they sell us as the top, is like Jacinto Benavente used to say, “the vested interests”. Now your work is good because it is worth money, and everything is about getting into a circuit. And in the end the important thing is to paint well .” The denoting of Sánchez’s work continues to be color, ”now it is purer, more expressionist than before, but it is not a series, because I do not open or close cycles, I just go on painting.”